By Neto Baptiste
President of the Leeward Island Cricket Board (LICB), Enoch Lewis, believes it was too early to start grading the performance of newly appointed coach of the sub-regional squad, Stuart Williams.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo Sports Show, Lewis said that Williams, a former West Indies opening batsman, took charge of the Leeward Islands Hurricanes just before the start of the 2019/2020 regional season last year.
“If you look at it from the four-day cricket, then you’d probably say that but what do you say of the team going to the finals [50 overs] for the first time in 10 years. Is that the coach or is that not the coach? The new coach was hired November or October or maybe just before that last year, so he hasn’t had the time to roll out a programme to these players and the first time he would have an opportunity to do so would be this off season,” he said.
The former cricketer added that Williams will now have an opportunity to put a proper programme in place ahead of the 2020/21 season.
“We will see what he puts in place this off-season because he came in, he saw, and he probably made minor adjustments here and there and whatever it is and he had success in the 50 overs tournament but not so much so in the four-day tournament, so it’s inconsistency but we will see what happens going forward,” Lewis said.
The Cricket West Indies (CWI) board member said the organisation has seen improvements in other cricket related areas as well.
“Four years ago, we didn’t have a women’s programme; four years ago, we didn’t have an under-17 tournament; there were no under-19 girls which we are now embarking on, and so development has to be part of what we do. What I mentioned to you is the fact that when I think of the resources they [other competing countries] have, we have no business competing with them but we do and we continue to produce players,” he said. Leeward Islands Hurricanes finished at the bottom of the standings in the Regional Four Day Championships but lost to Emerging players in the finals of the Super50.